


I Hate That Vulcan

by seekingferret



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-03
Updated: 2010-02-03
Packaged: 2017-10-07 00:10:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/59232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seekingferret/pseuds/seekingferret
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An attempt to explain what the hell 'red matter' is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Hate That Vulcan

I hate that Vulcan.

Science is about discovery. Science is about opening new worlds. Science is about probing the unknown. Science is about, like James Kirk's phrase, boldly going where no man has gone before.

That Vulcan bastard has no sense of adventure. He's a fucking engineer. Science officer, my ass. That man was never a scientist.

We discover a new particle and he wants to call it the Negatively Charged Hyper-Dense Singularity Stimulating Graviton. Yeah, when I get my Nobel Prize I want it to say that I discovered that mouthful! I told him I was going to call it Red Matter. I wanted a name my daughter could fucking pronounce.

He insisted his name was more logical. Pah! When Murray Gell-Mann needed a name for his new subatomic particle, did he go for something descriptive? The man reached into Finnegans Wake and pulled out quark. Now that's the kind of shit I'm talking about. John Wheeler named Black Holes. Zephram Cochrane called his discovery a warp drive. The name is as important as the discovery.

Tell that to the Vulcan. He only gave in when I threatened him with my tricorder. Ha! Those Starfleet pukes never think about how many ways you can kill with a tricorder. I've patented four different ways, on my own. Hell yeah. Who the fuck needs a phaser?

I wanted to run more tests before handing over my research to the engineers. I mean, yes, maybe we could reverse that supernova. But I'm a goddamn scientist. I don't commit before I'm sure I understand what's happening. "It's crazy, but it just might work" is not fucking science. It's tarot cards and entrail readings.

But that Vulcan bastard outranks me. (And confidentially speaking, after I ignored that fact, he sent in troops to prove it. I do admire a good experimental verification.)

So the motherfucking engineers come in, and they build a mobile containment chamber, and they take all of my red matter away. They don't even leave me a little to continue my research. It's going to set me back months. A kilogram was all I asked for! A goddamn kilogram. The assholes know that it took me three years and millions of credits to produce that stuff. (They know, too, that my accelerator shut down the power grid on Vulcan three times in the last year. Sometimes science requires sacrifice, you know.) But do I get compensated? Of course not. What Starfleet needs, Starfleet takes. Imbeciles!

Don't tell my wife, but I smile every time I see that asshole with the visor limping. He deserves it for stealing my samples. Goddamn. It felt good to kick him. Him and that Vulcan bastard.

Look, you're my therapist, right? You're the one who's supposed to help me adjust better to society. Cure my hatred of Vulcans, cure the selfishness that keeps me from giving freely of my knowledge. Fat chance. Don't you know anything about scientists? We're free spirits, dreamers. Nobody ever told Einstein to go to therapy. Nobody ever told Wernher von Braun he was crazy- to his face, at least. Goddamn commies.

No, I told you twenty times, I didn't do anything to his ship. If you had anything on me, I wouldn't be talking to you now. I'd be marooned on the damned ice planet or something. That creepy looking ship was under surveillance at all times, and I never went near it. If you ask me, it serves that bastard Spock right. I told him he didn't know enough about the red matter. He insisted on calling it by its 'logical name'. I guess he thought if he invoked the right sympathetic magic, he could harness its power. Superstitious hocus-pocus, like all that Vulcan crap. Mind-meld? Yeah, right. I want to see the studies.

I told him that calling it by a fancier name isn't going to help you understand it any better. Only research will do that, and that takes time. And money. Spock controlled the money, so I had to work with him, but believe me, if I'd had another choice I would have picked my own partner. Someone who actually understood science. Someone who would understand why I called it Red Matter.

Let me put it simply. The damned fool hijacked my samples, made up some jibber-jabber technobabble about how it would stop a supernova, swore it would work, and then flew out on an underpowered and undermanned ship to insert himself as the savior of worlds. Logical? My ass. He became convinced he could do science without doing any work, that he could work miracles through the cult of science. Classic Frankenstein complex. The shortcuts never work. Real science is hard work.

It's no wonder his ship disappeared. No, I don't know what happened. I told you, he took all of my samples. I couldn't research the problem if I wanted to, which I don't. You think I care how the Vulcan bastard disappeared?

Look, I understand deadlines as well as the next guy. I know the planet Romulus was being endangered by that supernova and there had to be quick and decisive action taken. Let's overlook the fact that my colleagues in the astronomy department have been agitating for money for years to study that supernova. Nobody ever provides funding for science until it's too late. Then they want you to pull off a miracle.

Spock, a science officer? Ha! What's his specialty? He never had one. He never did any legitimate research. He just pretended to be an expert. A dilettante, that's what he was. No wonder the Vulcans shipped him over to Starfleet. Those cold-blooded bastards probably couldn't stand him either.

But as I was saying, I understand there were time constraints. I know they had to do something to try to save Romulus, and I guess my Red Matter looked like the most promising option. That's also always the way, isn't it? These dumbass engineers never look for the best solution, just the one that uses the newest and shiniest technology. They're incapable of really thinking through a problem.

I mentioned five or six shielding technologies that probably could have protected Romulus from the onslaught. I mean, it's not like I'm an expert in shield technology, but I do keep up with the literature, you know? But that Vulcan dismissed them right out of hand. Quoted me a probability of success off the top of his head, would you believe that? The jackass said "The Suliban shield technology would have a 1.3% chance of successfully protecting Romulus from the radiation." As if he knew the first thing about obscure shield technologies.

Funny thing, though. After an event happens, all probabilities collapse to zero or one. The probability of that moronic Vulcan's Red Matter theory saving Romulus? It is now Zero point zero zero zero zero zero. The probability that a brilliant researcher will now have to waste years and millions more credits to get back to where he started? It is now one point zero zero zero zero zero. Fucking Vulcan. Science officer, my ass.

And seriously, no redundancy in his plan? No splitting the red matter between two ships in case one of them has a warp drive malfunction or something? No co-pilot in case the pilot becomes ill? Damnit, Starfleet can be stupid sometimes. Who did Ambassador Spock think he was? John Wayne? Luke Skywalker? James Kirk?

I tell you something, though. If James Kirk were still around, he wouldn't have let that dumb Vulcan pull a stunt like that. Kirk was reckless, true, but he was nobody's fool. Now that's what I call a hero. I can't figure out what he saw in Spock. But I tell you, the fact that Kirk could control Spock is one more proof that Kirk was a better man than I. May he rest in peace.

Amen.

And me? I guess I'm stuck here until you pronounce me sane, at which point I can go back to producing Red Matter and actually do the hard work of learning how it works. I mean, it's revolutionary, going to totally change the way we think about the universe, but I guess all it takes is a little mouthing off about that damned Vulcan and they lock you up and it's forget about the science. I guess they don't really care if they learn how Spock died. If they did, they wouldn't have locked me up with you. They'd be pouring money and lab space on me and urging me to finish my research. Not that research is ever finished, of course.

But when I think about it, I don't mind if you think I'm insane. All the great scientists, the ones who pioneered new paradigms, they were all called insane. Galileo was called in front of the Catholic Church and forced to recant his belief that the Earth moved. You know what he said under his breath? "But it does move." Talk about a scientific hero.

I guess that's what I should do, really. Apologize, tell you that I regret attacking those Starfleet engineers. Admit that I lost control of my emotions for a moment, but that I can learn to regain that control.

I mean, I do want to see my family again. I haven't seen my wife in two weeks. I haven't held her hand in three months. Rachel... I miss her. And my daughter... I don't want her to grow up without a father.

And I want to show her my Red Matter. I'll lead her into my lab by the hand, she shyly peeking out from behind me, her brown bangs dangling cutely in front of her eyes. And I'll point to my containment cell, say, "Look at that, Dina! Daddy discovered that. What do you think it is?"

And then my smart little daughter, my adorable Dina will look at it, she'll examine that piercing, relentless redness, and she'll guess, "Red stuff." And I'll laugh in delight, and scoop her into my arms, and say, "Almost, kiddo. We call it Red Matter. And it's the key to understanding how black holes form."

So I'll tell you what you want to hear. I'm a physicist! If I can't outsmart a psychologist, they ought to revoke my credentials. I'll apologize as sincere as can be, apologize so well it'll fool your polygraphs.

And then, under my breath...

"I hate that Vulcan."


End file.
